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Prepping Your Friday Pitch

One of the most important parts of Startup Weekend is the Pitch Fire session on Friday night. Anyone who wants to pitch gets 60 seconds to convince the crowd that their business idea is interesting, feasible, and meaningful. Teams will form around the top ideas pitched, so your pitch has to be one of the best! Sound intimidating? It doesn't have to be. Check out a few of our tips to help you craft the perfect pitch.

6 Elements of a Good Pitch

1. Focus on the problem you want to solve

How does your business idea solve a problem for you customer? Why is this an important problem to solve? How did this problem inspire you to create a business idea? This is usually the most important part of your pitch!

2. Mention how you think the problem should be solved

What's the solution to the problem? What product or service are you planning to create? Only spend a few seconds on this! You have to entire weekend to work through a solution.

3. Talk about your secret sauce

What's unique about your product or service? Do you bring any special skills or knowledge to the table?

4. Tell us what you already know

Have you already done a little work on your business? Market research, customer validation, a business plan?

5. Showcase your winning personality

Show your potential team members how awesome you'll be to work with! People want to be on teams with passionate, motivated, and interesting leaders.Be open and welcoming of new ideas.

6. Show up with an idea that does something meaningful

How will your business make your customers lives better? Will your business make the world a better place to live?

4 Pitch Pitfalls

1. Don’t go into too much detail about how your solution works. That's what the rest of the weekend is for!

2. Don’t spend too long on your personal background, this pitch is about the problem you’re solving.

3. Don’t be boring, make people remember you and make sure you seem fun/good to work with

4. Don’t leave the stage without telling the crowd who you need on your team (designers, developers, marketers, etc.) and make sure to name your pitch/idea!Something people can remember later.

Anatomy of a Pitch

A pitch should be unique to you, but some structure never hurts as a place to start. A simple template may look like:

[10 sec] Introduce and sell yourself

[20-30 sec] Describe the problem you want to solve

[10-20 sec] Describe your solution (e.g. explain the product)

[10 sec] What do you need to be successful during the weekend? ( people, skills, tools, etc )

We hope this helps you get prepared for SW Btown! We'll see you next weekend.